Pixar's 'Coco' Sweeps The 2018 Annie Awards

Last weekend saw one of the biggest events in the animation calendar, The Annie Awards, take place in Hollywood. Organised by ASIFA-Hollywood, the annual ceremony is a celebration of the phenomenal talent working in the industry. February 3 saw the 45th iteration of the awards, and the great and the good of the animation world assembled to pay tribute to the animation of the past year.

Pixar's Coco continued its domination of this year's awards season, picking up 11 awards out of 13 nominations. It should be noted, however, that it would have been impossible for it to win all 13, as in a couple of categories, the film was competing against itself. It took home the major awards for Best Feature, Best Directing In A Feature, and Best Writing In A Feature, plus numerous technical awards.

The second most nominated film, Nora Twomey's The Breadwinner was largely shut out, but did win Best Animated Feature- Independent. This win made history, as the first best animated feature award to be won by a film solo directed by a woman.

Beyond features, Disney's Mickey Mouse shorts picked up two awards. It was also a great night for Adult Swim, with Rick and Morty picking up two awards, and Samurai Jack winning three. In video games, the beautiful retro-stylings of Cuphead won it not only Best Animation In A Video Game, but also a special achievement award.

In terms of Juried Awards, The Urb Iwerks Award went to TV Paint, and the Winsor McCay Award recepients this year were James Baxter, Stephen Hillenburg and Wendy Tilby and Amanda Forbis.

This year's ceremony had an extra poignant note, as it was dedicated to the great June Foray who passed away last year. Foray was not only a legendary voice actress, but also a great advocate for animation, a co-founder of the organisation that would become ASIFA-Hollywood, and even the one credited with coming up with the idea for The Annies in the first place.

Check out the full list of winners below:

Best Animated Feature

Captain Underpants: The First Epic Movie

DreamWorks Animation

Cars 3

Pixar Animation Studios

Coco

Pixar Animation Studios

Despicable Me 3

Illumination

The Boss Baby

DreamWorks Animation

Best Animated Feature-Independent

In This Corner of the World

Taro Maki, GENCO, Inc. and Masao Maruyama, MAPPA Co., Ltd

Loving Vincent

BreakThru Films, Production Company Trademark Films, Co-Production Company

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